TL;DR: there's no need to feel hungry, you can graze on plain intact vegetables all day long. Use calisthenic exercise to keep you honest through feedback.
My experience going from 225lbs to 165lbs and keeping it there for over a decade now +-5lbs suggests there's no need to feel hungry at all, as long as I'm eating the right foods.
I didn't use any exercise, just removed sugars and most refined carbohydrates and processed foods in general. Most the food I eat by volume is raw organic produce. I can eat plain heads of lettuce all day long and I will not gain weight. I eat canned wild sardines, salmon, and sometimes tuna for protein and omega-3s, with the occasional (~weekly) meat binge.
Once my weight stabilized at 165, physical activity became a lot more appealing so I started hiking, running, doing hand stands, pushups, generally being more active and this has given me a more masculine physique but doesn't seem to play much part in maintaining my weight.
Sometimes I experiment by ceasing most physical activity for a week or two, and mostly what happens is I become less sexy looking, the weight is more or less the same with the uniform mostly-produce diet. My mood does deteriorate though.
When I deviate from the diet, usually for social reasons, eating meat more often or letting more refined carbs and generally processed foods in, my weight immediately goes up.
Another thing I've learned to appreciate about physical activity is the feedback it provides. Calisthenics like hand stands, pushups, pullups, all give direct feedback on your power:weight ratio. It's a lot more impactful to only be able to do 80 pushups when last week you were doing 100 every day, than see your weight increased by 10lbs on a bathroom scale. This feedback, for me, plays a more significant role in maintaining my weight through diet via exercise than any direct calorie burning.
It seems we arrived at the same place with similar tactics. Not sure where I will stop thinking about going down, and stay at a particular weight yet.
I find eating produce that just gets rid of hunger to be more unsatisfying that just being hungry.
I really really enjoy my dinner when I am hungry most of the day. My food is incredibly appealing and I have no concerns about how much I eat or what it is (generally speaking). So I guess the comparison here is "be hungry + eating whatever you want at the end of the day" vs "graze on vegetables all day".
My experiment is coming to a close soon though, as I am with you on the exercise benefits. My body is starting to get aches that I used to get before I started exercising. I've run regularly for years, but it didn't shed any weight unless I was perfectly diligent, which isn't something I could maintain just for weight loss.
Hence, I found the source to weight loss/control without extra effort, don't eat much. If I gain weight, eat less until it's gone. Exercise then is purely for strength and health, (and happiness as you have also found out) but not weight loss.
Happy to hear you got this under control in your life.
My experience going from 225lbs to 165lbs and keeping it there for over a decade now +-5lbs suggests there's no need to feel hungry at all, as long as I'm eating the right foods.
I didn't use any exercise, just removed sugars and most refined carbohydrates and processed foods in general. Most the food I eat by volume is raw organic produce. I can eat plain heads of lettuce all day long and I will not gain weight. I eat canned wild sardines, salmon, and sometimes tuna for protein and omega-3s, with the occasional (~weekly) meat binge.
Once my weight stabilized at 165, physical activity became a lot more appealing so I started hiking, running, doing hand stands, pushups, generally being more active and this has given me a more masculine physique but doesn't seem to play much part in maintaining my weight.
Sometimes I experiment by ceasing most physical activity for a week or two, and mostly what happens is I become less sexy looking, the weight is more or less the same with the uniform mostly-produce diet. My mood does deteriorate though.
When I deviate from the diet, usually for social reasons, eating meat more often or letting more refined carbs and generally processed foods in, my weight immediately goes up.
Another thing I've learned to appreciate about physical activity is the feedback it provides. Calisthenics like hand stands, pushups, pullups, all give direct feedback on your power:weight ratio. It's a lot more impactful to only be able to do 80 pushups when last week you were doing 100 every day, than see your weight increased by 10lbs on a bathroom scale. This feedback, for me, plays a more significant role in maintaining my weight through diet via exercise than any direct calorie burning.